A Hagar in our House

A space for Mang:

The most unexpected thing happened recently and it sifted our faith as well as tested how far we are willing to be dispensers of God’s grace to others. Our helper, Gema, has been with us for seven months and we have loved her as part of our family. Even then, she managed to lie about her boyfriend who impregnated and left her. Because the problem has become too enormous for Gema, she confessed everything to Grace. While the event hurt us all, perhaps it’s Grace who felt the greater impact of what happened. Here’s an excerpt of her reflection (which is posted in our web log http://tubaobrigade.blogspot.com).

I’ve not had much sleep since last night. It was confirmed that Gema, our helper, is pregnant. I was hurt because she lied to us. But more than that I ache for her life, her future, her unborn child…(While praying) I thought I heard Him (God) say, “Remember the story of Hagar?” I just wept. I remembered the story. I’ve always felt for Hagar more than for Sarah or Abraham. I felt that Hagar was a victim. She was used and was unjustly treated. Then I asked myself, “Am I a Sarah to Gema?”…I was asking myself whether I should send her away and let her suffer alone…I felt God was unfair for giving me this enormous responsibility for another person. “Can’t you give me an easier life?” I had to ask God. Was God actually telling me to minister to Gema and girls like her whose yearning for love led to a series of mistakes and irreversible consequences?

I hardly slept. I woke up with swollen eyes. I must have cried myself to sleep last night or I must have wept in my dreams. Gema admitted to me this morning that she used up all her savings because she and her boyfriend went to a hilot (a person who massages the abdomen to induce miscarriage) and tried to have an abortion. It failed. She’s still pregnant and now she is determined to keep the baby. I couldn’t help but think of how the prostitutes or the street youth ended up where they are now. I fear for Gema. At seventeen—without education, rejected by her boyfriend, afraid to go home—she has nowhere to go. What if she ends up in the street, selling herself, in order to raise her child? I wrestled within me and with God. We are here because we want to be agents of God’s transformation. Will I be that for Gema or will I be an added source of destruction for her? By the end of the day, I was asking God, “What do you want me to do? What do you want me to learn?”

I read Hagar’s story again a while ago. What struck me was the phrase “The One who sees”. I had to trust that God sees. God sees Gema. God sees the unborn baby. God sees me and my family.

I am helpless. I want to help Gema as much as I could. But I couldn’t. I don’t have the capacity right now. But the One who sees does. Certainly, He would give her a drink of living water.

I am lost. But the One who sees knows the way. Certainly, He would show what step to take and where to go.

I am apprehensive. But the One who sees is stable. If He wants to reach out to the Hagars out there with me as an instrument, then He would give me that capacity, the stamina, the compassion, the grace, and pretty much all it takes to let these girls know that there is One who sees.”

Grace and I have decided to let Gema stay with us. This could indeed be our “Hagar Ministry”. We want to help her go through this painful and difficult season. We want to journey with her as she prepares to be a mother. Peace came into our hearts as soon as we took this step of faith. We think that this is the confirmation we seek from God. He wants us to minister to Gema at this time. But you know what, we can’t do this alone. We need you! We need you to pray intensely for us that we could be God’s dispensers of grace even as we are also healing. Pray that God would give us immense faith to trust Him for our and Gema’s daily needs. Pray, too, for wisdom as to how we can help Gema inform her father (her mom died years ago) whom she hasn’t spoken with in years.